It’s A Long Way To The Top, But I’m Kind of on a Roll, by Davin Michael Stedman

Spent my day off working on a hook for Reggae Powerhouse Band with the magic Mell Dettmer.

Mell helped me overcome the dilemma that the hook I wrote for the outro the band leader loved, just doesn’t fit on the chorus section.

This is my first experience crafting a Riddim. There will be other versions of this song out there, but I am aiming to make my own version, and the version that my features my hooks, the absolute best.

Because that’s the point.

That’s the name of the game. This is where singers prove themselves on dub plates that were the Hip Hop Mix Tapes before Hip Hop sprang from the ribs of young Jamaicans and West Indians; Puerto Ricans, and Dominicans, in the sketchiest parks in New York City.

Riddims predate every Rap beef and recycled beat. My Puerto Rican Momma left the Bronx in 1969 and settled in LA where I was born as Hip Hop ventured out of New York City and became less and less Jamaican.

Riddims – this is one of the ways I keep rising through the ranks of Jamaican music on a global stage. This one of reasons this whole game to me is real AF, and the GAME that the Golden Age of Hip Hop trained me for.

Yo Marshall Hugh I remember people telling me at Jackson, I either had to rap or sing. But Lauryn Hill. But the Score. They still said that at WSU – Chris Godfrey remembers. Edica Esqueda remembers.

I just shook my head and “I do music” is all I said. The song should dictate what you do. Your abilities dictate what you can do.

I am gonna’ be me. And I am going to keep figuring that out. And I’ll serve the song. Always serve the song.

The Soul United Allstars, Alex George, Tom Wilkinson, Daniel Oliver, and Jeremy From-Steel Beans heard this instrumental on my phone, and they all went silent, and asked collectively asked,

“What is that? Why aren’t we playing that?”

I am not sure if we have time to adapt this by BrodieNation Music Festival. We still have to learn a trio of Staxx Brothers tunes they picked, but this could be another banger out of Kingston.

Who knows. I am just going to keep going in the studio in a quest to finish some great songs with all sorts of collaborators.

I’m gonna’ bring it, and I am going to hopefully have a band here, a band in New Orleans with Eric Struthers, a crew Jonathan Waller can pull together in Europe, a combo in Jamaica with Lenni I-Music that knows the hits;

…and pool of friends and aces in all those bands that wants to chase this thing around the world, as I go full Indiana Jones minus the cultural theft.

My harmonica, which I have criminally neglected is my bull whip.

Oh…and the drums on this track is Sly Dunbar, the bass is Robbie Shakespeare, and as I typed this last sentence the band leader sent me a black thumbs up via Whats App.

☆ Next we’ll discuss my first attempt at doing drops for DJs around the world. Oh boy. BJ DjSticky the files are on the way…

– Musician and writer Davin Michael Stedman has many ventures, such as the AMAZING blog, 100milesofmusic.com. Davin’s new song has become a global earworm and Caribbean dancehall hit. Listen here on Reggaeville: DAVIN MICHAEL STEDMAN & ANTHONY RED ROSE – FREE YOUR MIND FEAT. SLY & ROBBIE WITH LENKY MARSDEN. The video is now available on Youtube: Tuff Gong Television. His single with British band Sherlock Soul is available here.